u/DomDom_Glubber

I just ran my second session of dragon of icespire peak last night. Some mild spoilers for that session too follow, beware.

I ran the first session for a group of 2 because everyone else canceled and it was one of the best sessions I've ever played. We only play once a month and it takes me about that long to get the miniatures printed and painted. Plus, I'm married with 3 kids, so it takes a lot of my little free time to prep these things.

Well last night we had our second session and another friend came over for it. He ended up going with a dragonborn draconic sorcerer and kept insisting cryovain was his dad. He didn't have a character sheet made, so we ended up starting late. The party went to a gold mine occupied by a gang of wererats and he used alter self to look like a wererat and tried to just walk past the guards. He just kept saying he was there to work his shift at the mine. When they wouldn't let him pass he immediately started trying to intimidate them into letting him in. I had the wererats tell him they would take him to see their leader. Again he insisted to the gang boss that he was part of the gang and just wanted to start his shift. I told him again, this is a small gang and they know everyone in it. THEY DONT BELIEVE YOU! After some in game arguing between him and the wererats they attack.

Now he is annoyed with me because I didn't let him steamroll the quest. After he is knocked unconscious, the other party members parlay with the rats and decide to further the quest.

After they decide they aren't ready for the next part of that quest, they decide to investigate a ranch that was attacked by orcs. Even though the quest is to rescue the ranch owner, he is insisting the party just burns down the farmhouse to avoid fighting the orcs. It got to the point where I just said, you guys kill the rest of the orcs without any more combat. And I gave them the reward and just ended it there.

This was the least fun I've ever had playing D&D. Am I overreacting? I feel like I've worked really hard on prep just to have him come in and blow up every storyline.

So I just finished my first session for a couple of friends and they investigated the Dwarven Excavation and saved the midwife from the manticore. They are now level 3 and could possibly be heading to butterskull ranch or the tower of storms. One is a world tree barbarian and the other is a way of mercy monk. Should I give the monk +1 fistwraps from the sunken ship or would they be too powerful since it would be the equivalent of getting two +1 weapons? Also, since there isn't anyone in the party who can use the mithril chain, would mithril half plate be too powerful? A mithril Breastplate seems silly as the point of the armor is to negate the disadvantage on stealth checks. Not only could they get half plate at level 3, but essentially get a pair of boots of elvenkind. What are your thoughts?

Oh, and there might be additional players joining from time to time, but probably not on a regular basis.

So I'm a newer DM. I have run the lost mines campaign before I had even played D&D before. Since then, I have played a couple of 1 shots, CoS to completion, and ToD which ended at level 3 when a couple players moved away. I was looking to start a new campaign and IWD looked interesting. Is this a good campaign for a newer DM to run? Do you have any advice for story tweaks to have it run smoothly?

Typically, the guys I play with are more interested in combat, but I want to try to get them a little more into the role play aspect of the game. Im hoping this is a combat centered campaign with good draws to the role play elements. It seems like having such small communities like 10 towns, there will be more consequences for murder hoboing, which I'm hoping won't occur, but you never know.

FYI, I have not yet bought the book but I plan to soon.